


The Memories We Make

by WorryinglyInnocent



Series: Maison Rouge ficlets [1]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: AU, F/M, Maison Rouge, Smut
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-03-25
Updated: 2015-03-25
Packaged: 2018-03-19 15:42:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,593
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3615378
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/WorryinglyInnocent/pseuds/WorryinglyInnocent
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A short one-shot in the Maison Rouge universe, set sometime during chapter eight, the night after Belle's nightmare in chapter seven. Shaken by her broken night, Belle wants to make a new memory to go to sleep with.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Memories We Make

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: contains allusions to past domestic violence.

Belle sits at her dressing table, looking at the dark shadows under her eyes. She didn't sleep again after her nightmare, and unlike Rum, she was too scared to catnap during the day to make up for it. Rum comes across and gently takes the hairbrush from her unmoving fingers, deftly untying her braid and beginning to run the brush through her locks, every stroke of the bristles followed by one of his hand. The motion is soothing, and Belle leans into his palm like a cat. When her hair is once more silky smooth, he presses a kiss to the top of her head. Belle twists on the dressing table stool to capture his mouth and hook her arms around his neck, pulling him in closer, as close as possible and still not close enough. Rum buries his hands in her just-brushed hair as he explores every corner of her mouth with his clever tongue, confident of his ministrations but at the same time respectful and not intrusive. It's a kiss filled with the promise of treasures to come, and that's exactly what Belle wants. But as Rum breaks away and she opens her eyes, missing his touch already, she can see the little frown line appearing between his brows.

"Are you sure Belle?" he asks. "You must be exhausted after last night."

"I am. But it's not a good kind of exhausted. I'd rather it was. I'll never get to sleep with the memory of last night still on my mind. I want you to be the last thing I think of before I go to sleep; I want to make a new memory." She stands so that she can better look him in the eye, her fingers toying with the ends of his hair. "Don't you?"

Rum smiles. "More than anything." He tucks a stray curl behind her ear. "You're so beautiful."

This is one of the things that Belle loves most about being with Rum. No matter what, no matter how tired she looks or how many of her scars are showing, he will always make her feel beautiful. The way he looks at her can't be faked, and he looks at her that way every day without fail. He gazes at her like she's the most gorgeous, most precious thing in the world, and he can't believe how lucky he is to have her. Belle can't believe how lucky she is to have him, this wonderful man who understands her and knows her and loves her in spite of everything that has happened in her past, and who makes her feel beautiful after so long thinking no-one could ever desire her again. That he wants her, wants to make love to her, is miraculous in itself.

Rum presses his lips to the corner of hers and trails open-mouthed kisses down over her chin and jaw, avoiding her neck where she is sometimes sensitive and moving straight to her right shoulder and collar bone. He won't touch the scars tonight, Belle already knows that. He kisses and licks along the pink and white lines sometimes. She does the same to his, perhaps hoping that they can heal the hurt with touch alone, but they won't tonight. Tonight they don't want anything to link their love to their past.

Belle pushes Rum's waistcoat off his shoulders and begins to unbutton his shirt, pressing a kiss to each new inch of skin that she uncovers. Rum's fingers are back carded in her hair, and she feels his hold on her tresses tighten a little as she pushes the shirt open and her fingertips graze his nipples. She smiles at the effect she has on him, and walks him carefully back towards the bed. He untangles his hands from her hair and makes to pull her camisole over her head, but she backs off a little, shaking her head with a smile. She wants to make this new memory and shape it in the way she wants, so that she can remember it in the way she wants as she drifts off to sleep. She pulls off her skirt and tights quickly and rejoins Rum on the bed, clambering into his lap and crossing her ankles behind his back before kissing him deeply. Rum's fingers dance up and down her spine, and as her own hands continue exploring, she can feel his cock beginning to twitch beneath her a little. Belle makes to push his shirt down his arms but is hindered by his cufflinks. She giggles, and Rum smiles and releases his hold on her to undo the links and pull off the shirt before responding to her unspoken request for him to lie back.

Belle thinks about the first time she saw Rum's bare chest. It wasn't the first time they made love, or even the second or third. Their first few times had been shy, fumbling affairs under the covers, surrounded by kind and comfortable darkness with Belle's nightie rucked around her hips and Rum's pyjama trousers tangled at his knees. But one night, illuminated by the silver moonlight that forced its way round the edge of the curtains, their usually tentative and shy kisses had taken on a headier aspect, and together they had pulled off their nightclothes as easily as breathing. Belle still remembers the eerie glow that the moonlight had cast over Rum's skin, and wondering if she had ever seen anything more perfect. They had not got any further after that, both suddenly aware that despite being lovers for a few weeks, this was the first time they had lain naked together, seen all of each other, and they were both content to slow down and map the other's skin with their eyes.

Belle knows every inch of Rum's body now; she's seen and touched and kissed him all over and knows the places to make him fall apart with a single sweep of her fingertips. She does this now, enjoying the little noises he can't help but make as she rakes her hands over his chest. His stomach quivers under her fingers as she traces the line of dark hair that runs down from his navel to vanish under his waistband. She's tempted to dip her hand under his belt and into his trousers, but she knows that this position, lying back on the bed with his feet still braced on the floor, is not the most comfortable for him. Not entirely without reluctance, she moves off his lap and scoots up the bed. Rum rolls languidly onto his stomach and watches her plump the cushions there and turn down the covers, creating a little cocoon out of their bed for them to curl up and make sweet and gentle love in.

Once everything is arranged to her liking, he gets up and walks round the bottom of the bed, coming up to the head. He makes to undo his belt, but Belle's fingers stay his on the leather.

"Can I, please?"

Rum teases his fingertips up her bare arms. "If you want, sweetheart."

"I like undressing you," she says by way of explanation, kneeling up to give her the right height. She makes quick work of his belt and buttons, and pulls his trousers and underwear down his legs slowly. He's halfway hard already, and Belle kisses the nest of thick hair at the base of his cock before looking up at him and taking the time to admire the planes of his body. Rum is a thin man, that she’s always known, but he’s wiry rather than scrawny; the strength that he needed as a flyman is still there, coiled beneath the surface.

"Oh Belle, my darling."

She smiles up at him and shuffles backwards on the bed so that he can get on it too, and once he's lying in a comfortable position, he reaches out to touch her, run his fingers over her bare thighs, and Belle needs no further invitation to take him in her arms and kiss him as if her very life depends upon it. He's just as fervent in his caresses, and she feels one hand come up under her camisole to hold her breast through her bra. His thumb ghosts over the padded cup, never quite finding her nipple, and suddenly the underwear is more of an annoyance than just another layer of armour against the outside world. She kisses her way to his ear as he continues his gentle petting.

"Just undo it," she whispers against his skin. His fingers dance along the ticklish line under her arm and find the bra clasp, but soon enough they are back on her breast, slipped up under her bra cup and rolling her nipple under his palm. Belle feels the little nub stiffen and she shivers with anticipation. She pushes one of her legs between his and feels him getting harder against her thigh.

Presently Rum slides his hand down from her breasts and dips his fingers into the waistband of her knickers, quirking an eyebrow in a silent request for permission. They’ve learned to read each other very well, knowing each other’s little tells and triggers. Belle nods and he pulls the underwear down and she wriggles it off altogether. The cool air in the bedroom teases the wetness between her thighs and she shivers. In the next moment she decides it’s time to cut her losses and she sits up a bit, letting Rum help her out of her tangle of bra and camisole so that she’s skin on skin with him.

Belle pauses for a moment, not wanting to look down at her arms, and Rum reaches across to turn the light off. Immediately she feels safer in the dark. They don’t often make love with the lights on; if they have light it’s normally soft candlelight, or the dim, slightly flickering bulb of her reading light. It’s not that Belle is ashamed of her body per se, but there are times when she just does not want to see it, does not want to see the scars that remind her of what happened before she met Rum. She knows that they don’t put him off, that to him they are just another part of her and she is just as beautiful with them, because after all, he has never seen her without them.

Belle wishes, sometimes, that Rum could have seen her before she got all her scars. But then she remembers the sharp lines across his lower back and she realises she’s never wondered what he would look like without them, so why on earth would he wonder what she looks like without her own survival marks?

She takes him in her arms and Rum’s lips capture hers in a kiss that only stops when she has to draw breath. It’s then that Belle pauses, her arms round Rum’s neck and his cock flush against her centre. They're nearly joined, nearly complete, but Belle's brow furrows as she casts her mind back to the morning and tries to remember, a task made harder by Rum's fingertip teasing her, stroking around her clit but never touching where she wants him.

His other hand moves from its ministrations on her hip and comes up to cup her cheek, pressing his thumb to the frown line between her brows.

"What's the matter, darling?" he asks.

"I don't think I took my pill this morning," Belle mutters. Reluctantly she disentangles her limbs from his, feeling the loss of his cock against her slick heat the moment they separate, and she moves up to scrabble in the bedside drawer for condoms and lube. Normally she's wet enough naturally, when it's just his skin inside her, but when there's latex causing friction as well, they both prefer a little help from Ann Summers. Her fingers fumble on the foil packaging in her arousal and impatience, until Rum takes the packet from her and carefully tears into it with his teeth.

The lubricant on his fingers warms her even more as he slips them back into her cleft, and she squirms with a low groan of pleasure as he finally finds her clit. The need to be quiet is a constant worry in the back of Belle’s mind, knowing that only a thin wall separates their bedroom from the one that Ruby and Emma share. She’s accepted that their love is never going to be silent, but she wants to minimise the chance of being overheard as much as possible. Rum helps in that regard; he’ll kiss her to quieten her if he thinks she’s getting too loud, swallowing her moans. It feels more intimate like that, somehow, knowing that he’s the only one to hear her fall apart.

She’s falling apart now, building towards a beautiful climax as Rum’s slippery fingers continue to dance around her clit, now stroking along her folds, now dipping into her entrance, now back up to her clit. She clings to him like a life-raft, burying her face into his shoulder, muffling her sob of ecstasy as she reaches that glorious peak and tumbles over it.

“ _Rum.”_

When she comes back to herself, Rum’s hand is anchored on her hip, rubbing little circles over her skin and leaving wet patterns there, her honey and the lubricant mingling on his fingers as he croons nonsense into her hair. It’s mostly Gaelic endearments, but she hears the words ‘I’, ‘love’, ‘you’ and ‘beautiful’ in there.

There’s a moment in which they’re still and calm for a moment, just holding each other and panting quietly, but then Belle snakes her hand down between them to fondle Rum’s cock, teasing him back to full hardness and running her fingers up and down his shaft. After all, his night was as traumatic as hers; he needs this as much as she does. It takes a bit of wriggling, but then he’s finally pressing into her, and Belle can’t think of anywhere else that she wants to be but here in his arms, his fingers digging into her bottom as he moves in her, lavishing her chin and lips with sloppy kisses, riding out the throes of his orgasm as he continues to thrust erratically until he’s completely spent and he stills.

Finally he opens his eyes and looks at her through his lashes, a look of utter adoration and satisfied post-coital exhaustion.

“Here’s to a better night’s sleep,” he says, and Belle can’t help but laugh. He twists a lock of hair round his finger and watches the curl spring back. “I love you, Belle.”

“I love you too.”

She doesn’t want to move and doesn’t want Rum to move, and she feels somewhat bereft when he slips out of her and rolls over out of her arms to sort himself out. But then he’s back, pulling the covers right up to her chin and cuddling her close beneath them. Belle burrows down into her nice, safe cocoon of blankets and nestles her head against his chest.

“Got enough air in there?” he asks with a chuckle above her. Belle nods, and Rum strokes her hair.

“This is a much better memory,” she says eventually. “Thank you.”

“My pleasure.”

“No, mine.”

They laugh, and Rum keeps petting her gently, and if she were a cat, Belle knows she would be purring like a foghorn.

Nothing more is said and she stays warm, protected and loved in Rum’s arms, drifting off into a deep and blissfully dreamless sleep.


End file.
